


Conjurer Laureate

by skeletonsandroundabouts



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Demon Summoning, Post-Almost Apocalypse (Good Omens), Short One Shot, cringe culture is dead, this could be seen as a really roundabout Faust AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:33:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23959984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skeletonsandroundabouts/pseuds/skeletonsandroundabouts
Summary: England seems to be the only person in the world who remembers that turbulent week last summer when the world almost came to an end, and there is only one person who can tell him why that is.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 40





	Conjurer Laureate

England wasn’t going to pretend that he hadn’t seen the signs. The warnings. The omens, if you will. The nation was the finest necromancer in Britain, second only to Marlowe’s Faust, yes he knew when things were going haywire in the realm of the supernatural.

It was insane! England was quite rightfully  _ humiliated _ that he had never thought to consider the ley lines, at least, not until it was too late.

And yet, somehow, the apocalypse came and went in just one week (And in  _ Oxfordshire _ of all places, England couldn’t think of the last time he’d stepped foot there…) and then daily life continued as if nothing had happened.

If you asked anyone about that week, they’d just tell you that it had been the most uneventful seven days of their life. Every person gave that answer, even all of England’s fellow nations.

But when something happens on your own territory, you don’t tend to forget it so easily. It’s especially hard to forget when your largest ringway suddenly combusts, killing thousands. (Thousands who, incidentally, would be more than happy to tell you how boring that day had been.  _ ‘I mean, gawd, it was if I had died, I had legitimately nothing to do _ .’)

After the End That Wasn’t, there seemed to be dozens of tiny, little changes scattered about the land. They were indeed  _ very _ minute differences, and they were incredibly hard to notice even if you remembered the events of that horrible week, but they were there nonetheless.

A country road with an altered name, flowers in your garden with an altered hue, an extra pencil with your stationary. The strangest thing was that all of these changes were actually improvements. That road name was very hard to pronounce for anyone not local to the area, the color of the flowers just made them blend in with the rest of the plants, all of your pencils had had their erasers worn down.

England considered himself the only person who remembered what had happened, and as far as he was concerned, he was the only person capable of figuring out what exactly it was that he was remembering.

The events were supernatural in nature, so of course the only logical thing to do was to consult the supernatural for answers.

England had had a deep passion for evocation ever since he was a young lad of 103, and had been sacrificed as an offering to some forgotten Celtic persuasion. In a spare room, with curtains  _ tightly _ drawn, lay his summoning circle, drawn up in all the properly occult ways that one would expect a summoning circle to be.

England hesitantly stepped up to its perimeter. Before any voice in his head could persuade him out of his future actions, England read aloud from a decrepit looking book:

_Sint_ _mihi dei Acherontis propitii! Valeat numen triplex_

_ Iehovoe! Ignei, aerii, aquatani spiritus, salvete! _

_ Orientis princeps Belzebub, inferni ardentis monarcha, _

_ et Demogorgon, propitiamus vos, ut appareat et surgat _

_ rem mali. _

“Arise!” he screeched.

The circle began to glow a blinding yellow, or perhaps it was blue? No, it was definitely red. Whatever it was, England couldn’t inspect too closely, for he had to shield his eyes from the radiating circle.

He peeked through his fingers to see a three dimensional form slowly actualize on the floor. A success! And his first since 1924!

When the form was finished… forming, there in the circle lay a man. England was a bit disappointed. If he was going to get a demon, then it might as well look hellish. This demon just looked like a Hamburg-era Beatles member. Or at least, it dressed like one. He lay face-down, with his cheek pressed into the floor. He looked quite uncomfortable.

“Let me help you up old man,” England said, lending out a bony hand. “You do speak English, I hope. My Latin’s not what it used to be.”

“ _ Speak _ English? I  _ am _ English!” The demon propped himself up, but his head hung low from exhaustion.

“Aha! Me too!”

“I really hadn’t noticed.”

“No, I suppose when one’s locked behind the barbed gates of Hell, there’s not much time for a holiday! Not so much time to see the world.”

Finally, the summoned figure stood up straight to face England.

_ No! _

That couldn’t be!

“Is this some kind of practical joke!?” England raised his book as a weapon. His demon looked equally as taken aback. “There is  _ no possible way _ that you’re… what, when did I see you last, 1943? You were killed! Shot! No, I remember, I saw you once more in ‘86, but I thought it was just your son. And that’s only counting the recent times I saw you!

“First time, I  _ think _ , was in 815, and it was a banquet in Aquitaine… and then I saw you thirty years later in Wales, and I thought my mind was playing tricks on me! But there you were, time and again. I always wondered if maybe you were Londinium, or something slightly obscure, but really, you were an agent of Hell!”

“Trust me,” said the carrot-topped devil. “I am  _ just _ as confused as you are.”

“I’m afraid that under international law, I cannot disclose very much.” England tossed his book from hand to hand. “But I can assure you, I have been around for a  _ very _ long while, and it has been me that you’ve been seeing.”

“Well, I’d like to go home. I was in the middle of something.”

“I can’t send you back to Hell just yet! I’m sure you’re very busy torturing some poor old bastard, but I need you to give me some answers before I can let you go!”

“First of all,” said the demon, suddenly appearing to be very tall. “There’s no need to ‘send me back’ anywhere. I live in Mayfair. And secondly, I was  _ trying _ to put together an IKEA table before you rudely scooped me up!”

England noticed that he had let his mouth hang open. “You mean there are  _ demons _ living in Britain?”

“That’s rich, coming from whatever you are. Last I saw of you, you had a moustache and were running for MP in West Sussex!”

“You never answered my question!”

“Alright, well there aren’t  _ demons _ living in Britain, there’s just one. Most demons don’t like it up here, anyhow. The modern world moves too fast for them.”

England pitied the man in front of him. “It must get lonely.”

The demon stayed silent.

“Do they still call you Crowley?”

“Do they still call you Lord Kirkland?”

England smiled. “I dropped the title during the Great Depression. I felt it alienated myself from the people of this nation.”

“Cool. Where is this house? I’d like to get back to my business.”

“Not so fast! I don’t just summon damned creatures on a whim, you know! I need you to explain some  _ very _ important things to me!”

“I really don’t know anything--”

“What happened in  _ that week _ of August 2018?”

The question clearly caught Crowley off guard.

England grinned wickedly. “Finally! Someone who remembers! I thought it was only me for so long!”

“You thought wrong! Gosh, I know of at least nine people, not counting myself, who can not only remember the incident, but were also involved in it.”

“You were  _ involved _ ?”

Crowley nodded. “Yes, my… associate and I were trying our best to prevent the events that took place. We didn’t do a very good job, but it all worked out in the end. How come you remember it, I would have thought Adam had taken care of everyone?”

“I really can’t tell you. I’m sorry.”

Crowley narrowed his eyes, or maybe he just lowered his eyebrows. It was hard to tell with his sunglasses.

“Say, before I ask you anything more, would you mind taking your glasses off. It’s already incredibly dark in here, and if it weren’t for that light coming from the circle, I doubt you’d be able to see a single thing.”

“I do mind, actually. They complete the look.”

“Oh, I see. Well in that case, could you explain to me what happened that week.”

“Prophecies. Anti-christ. Apocalypse. Apocalypse averted.”

“That’s hardly a complete explanation!”

Crowley walked towards the door. “You keep your secrets, I’ll keep mine.”

England followed him out the door, and led his visitor outside the house. He didn’t know why he was doing it, exactly, as he would have liked to press Crowley for more information, but in that moment, parting ways just seemed like a delightful idea.

“Can I call you an Uber, or something,” England asked, as he closed his front door. But when he turned around to receive Crowley’s answer, he found that the demon had vanished into thin air.

They would see one another many more times, after that. They never spoke, never exchanged more than a respectful nod, a passing glance before Crowley would be pulled along somewhere by a strange blond man, who, now that England thought of it, he had seen before hundreds of times! The pair would have always gone off somewhere before England could get a second look at them, but perhaps it was for the best.

Crowley would always have his secrets, and England would always have his.

  
  



End file.
